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This chapter was a very interesting read. In the section titled, “Myspace vs. Facebook: Subjective Differences, Levinson states that “the principle is that we most love what we first experience”. Levinson makes a good point here. If we first experience and read a series and watch the movie, we won’t love it as much. But if we watch the movie first and then read the series, we won’t be as impressed. He then says that when you have a good amount of people on one site, your more likely going to use and like it more than the other. In the section listed Myspace vs Facebook: Objective Differences, Facebook has a much higher ratio of real-life friends than Myspace. Facebook is now popularly seen as a family-based site where families can go and connect with each other in an easier way. Another difference that Levinson brings up is that Myspace allows creators to decorate their profile with images, different colors, and sounds while Facebook is very general and everyone has the same layout which makes more mature people attracted to Facebook. Facebook has made some changes to their site allowing creaters to add a cover photo to their profile. Also, Myspace and Facebook both have “groups” who share and discuss different things, depending on the group.

Some people believe that social sites like Facebook, Myspace, and Bebo (which is unfamiliar to me) are corrupting the young youths live. They think that social sites are doing nothing but destroying them. This article specifically talks about social networking sites because public, private, etc. To create a profile on any one of these sites, the user is asked to represent themselves through their personal profiles. How they see themselves, teens post pictures, statuses, videos, etc. Social Networking sites aren’t really private. Unless someone sets their profile as private, then yes, the profile is private. But, for the most part, as far as I know, most people have their profile set as public. I am kind of surprised by that because anyone and anybody could view one’s profile and find a lot about someone because of the amount of information a usual profile contains. A lot of people’s so-called “friends” aren’t really their friends, just random people that “they know”. A lot of people just add people if they’re a friend of their friends. In addition, people like to be nosey and add people just to see what they’re doing. Public Safety is defiantly something that should be looked over because someone’s profile is their identity, who they are, where there from, and what they are doing.

I actually really enjoyed this article. It was really interesting. This article makes a whole lot of sense. I can relate with the author’s major points. To begin with, I am “friends” with a lot of people on Facebook but I have never seen them in person. In the beginning, the article illustrates Tyson Balcomb who quite Facebook after he rid the elevator with a women that he had never met before but knew her quite well through Facebook. Balcomb knew what her older brother looked like as well as where she was from. He felt like it was unhealthy. Now that I think of it, it is kind of weird. Because of the amounts of things people post, you begin to know the person virtually. I defiantly haven’t felt alienated. Like I said, I would never go as far as not calling my close friends or anything. To me, that’s going a little over board. It’s crazy because people have a better connection with people online than face-to-face conversations.

I thought it was interesting to see how not having Facebook affects people. In the article, it states that a women actually missed engagements and pictures of newborn babies. Another good thing about Facebook is that they’ll actually remind you of upcoming events and birthdays which helps in one way or another. The article says that about “16 percent of Americans don’t have cellphones”. That means that 16 percent of Americans don’t care to communicate or stay in touch with people or simply just don’t care for a phone itself. So, in regards to that, Facebook doesn’t expect everyone to sign up and make an account. I mean Facebook is one of those accounts that people either love or hate. For the most part, people do love Facebook but there’s defiantly things that need to be worked on.

It’s interesting to see the competition between the many new technologies. It’s obvious that the new generation remakes media in its own image. Personally, I don’t really watch cable as much as I used to because I always feel so busy. I don’t have as much free time as I used to. It’s crazy to think how much people react to new technologies. The shifting of “What’s Hot” has transformed so quickly. For instance, when Netflix came out, more and more people were moving away from going out to the movies and paying almost $12 to watch a movie. People would rather wait until the movie was displayed on Netflix or even on demand. I know a lot of people, who watch movies at home, or on their IPads or even on their phone. I am damaged enough by technology, that it kind of scares me. I wonder what’s new technologies will be next…wishful thinking..

Is Google Making Us Stupid? By Nicholas Carr, illustrated by Guy Billout

This article describes what the internet is doing to society’s brains. The first part of his article starts off with a guy who claims that his “mind is going” which clarifies that he’s losing his smarts. He feels like someone or something is fiddling with his brain and messing up his memory. Overall, he feels like his mind is changing. “The deep reading that used to come naturally has become a struggle”. He feels like all the things he used to do, like a read a book or a lengthy article used to be easy. But now, as time passes and he notices that things are changing with his brain, it’s just not the same. He came to a realization that he knows what is going on. He’s noticed that he’s been spending a good amount of his time online, searching and surfing the Internet. He sees the Net, as he describes a “universal medium, the conduit for most of the information that lows through my eyes and ears and into my mind”. The Net seems to be affecting attentiveness and thought. Next, he brings up other individuals who are in the same situation. Scott Karp, writer of a blog about online media confessed that as a lit major, he stopped reading books. Does that make any sense?

I think that Carr’s article was very interesting. I’ve understood that the older generation would rather talk in slang language and “texting language” rather in English words. The older generation doesn’t seem to appreciate classic literature. Carr emphasizes in his article that the internet and other new technologies are making the modern generation very lazy, and he’s right. Sometimes, I see myself skimming online articles to find information, and most times I pay no attention to the writing language. Having quick access to information, such as using Google has affected the world, and has really improved our world also. I see it as a problem, but then I don’t. If I am able to search up information quickly rather than searching up articles to get the information I need, then why not take advantage of the technologies that we have today?

In the book titled, New New Media, Levinson argues about Wikipedia which he describes “the most through-going, constantly user-driven system on the Internet” (90). To start, I think it’s crazy that people visit Wikipedia every now and then and edit information on many different topics. Everyone has access to it at all times. This is why it is very known that Wikipedia cannot be trusted, therefore unreliable. It’s good to know that Wikipedia pages get locked and shut down entirely out of people’s control. People feel like they have a lot of ownership which I think is interesting. Last year, the day that selected sites were shut down, such sites like Wikipedia was shut down, and people had no control. But did it affect anyone? Wikipedia is moderated. But, any user can edit information at whatever time. I learned from today’s class that if the add-ons are inappropriate, the admin will delete it, and comment back and tell the person the reason. Since all readers of Wikipedia can be editors of the site, a preliminary survey reported that 90 percent of Wikipedia edits were made by the top 15 percent of the most active Wikipedia editors. A section of the lengthy Chapter is titled, “Does Wikipedia Make Libraries Unnecessary?” I thought this question was interesting. Can Wikipedia be seen as an Encyclopedia? A question proposed in our class discussion. In my opinion, Wikipedia makes libraries necessary. Like mentioned before, most of the information on Wikipedia is not true. It’s always something that’s changing it’s so easy to edit (no account needed) and vandalizes a page. Wikipedia is basically volunteering. Overall, Wikipedia is not any better than a library. A library has real sources from actual sources and books that back up their theories.

**Awhile back, I used to rely on Wikipedia for all my information until I found out that it was edited by random people. I never really knew why teachers would always say to stay away from Wikipedia, I now know why…it all makes sense.